


make me, old man

by deniigiq



Series: Dumpster Fires Verse [23]
Category: Daredevil (TV), Deadpool - All Media Types, Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017)
Genre: Gen, Kinda, Smoking, Team Bonding, Team Dynamics, Team Red, Team as Family, Tension, Underage Smoking, being assholes, between Tony and the disaster duo, but not really whatever, vaping & e-cigarettes, vaping yo
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-02
Updated: 2018-11-02
Packaged: 2019-08-14 16:53:44
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,095
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16496507
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/deniigiq/pseuds/deniigiq
Summary: “Mr. Stark wants to talk to you.”Ah, fuck.(Wade gets a vape pen and Tony tries to put some distance between Peter and Team Red. It doesn't work.)





	make me, old man

**Author's Note:**

> hi over here with a disclaimer that, while I could give less than a shit what adult humans do and put into their bodies, I don't condone underage smoking and pete doesn't actually smoke in this one.

Weasel swore that it had helped him quit smoking, which he seemed to forget was of zero consequence to him, Cancer McCancerson the third, but it was unusual of Weasel to be running around giving people gifts, so Wade took the vape with grace.

He rescued it from the cat the next morning and went to a shop to pick up some of the vape accoutrements Dom informed him he could not exist on this mortal plane without.

Berry swirl.

Vanilla cream.

Fucking papaya.

How did people fucking choose?

He bought twelve. Wasn’t his fault. He was but a man.

 

 

Spidey was interested in the vape and for a split second, Wade thought about handing it over to let him try it, but then something in the lizard part of his brain told him to hold that fucking thought.

He examined the kid in his preppy little blazer.

The kid examined him back.

He examined the kid _closer_.

“Is your aunt gonna f--”

“Do you think we can make the smoky stuff blue?”

It caught Wade off-guard. He stared down at the pen, and then looked back at the kid.

He was so smart. _Fuck_. He was so smart.

“No clue, but if we’re gonna do anything, it’s _gotta_ be black.”

 

 

“Mr. Stark wants to talk to you.”

Ah, fuck.

“Tell him I’m not home.”

“He says—”

The tinny speaker on the kid’s phone roared in frustration.

Oh, for the love of Christ. He sighed and held out a hand.

“Give it here,” he groaned. Spidey handed the phone over.

 

 

Wade personally thought it was unfair for Stark to get involved over some fucking food coloring, but whatever. It wasn’t his job to babysit the kid. He’d never claimed to be a good influence. He wasn’t even sure he could claim to be _an_ influence on Spidey, given the way he picked up Red’s bad habits like it was his fucking job.

“What’s that?” Red asked curiously on the roof. He tapped a finger against the end of the pen.

Nevermind that, everyone shut the fuck up. Hold everything. The Devil is in the building.

“You ever vaped?” Wade asked casually, holding the pen out to him. Their target wasn’t coming for a minute. They had time, Wade’s rifle, and Red’s ears. It was more of a camp site than a stake out.

Red cocked his head.

“Nah, smoked some in college. Alcohol’s my preferred poison.”

“Try it,” Wade offered, practically clenching his jaw to tamp down the joyous anticipation.

Red did, and Wade immediately started composing a list of other shit to get him to try once he’d recovered the damn thing from the roof gutter.

Red did his damnedest to bust a lung. Wade picked the pen out of one of the cracks in the concrete and leaned over to dutifully hammer on Red’s back until he was wheezing more or less normally.

“S’fucking horrible,” Red pronounced.

Nah, it wasn’t that bad.

 

 

“Wade, everyone online says that food coloring’s probably toxic if you inhale it,” the child who did not learn informed him. Wade didn’t really know what to say to that.

“And?” he tried.

Spidey stared at him with a pout for a millisecond before he understood. He lit up.

“Do you think we can add glitter?” he asked, brimming with excitement.

Fuck _yeah_ , they could add glitter. What kind of question was that?

 

 

“—absolutely irresponsible. He’s a fucking minor, Wilson. And, uh. Whoever the fuck you are--”

If Stark did not leave that rooftop in the next four seconds, Red was gonna throw him off it. It would be vicious, unnecessary, and beautiful. And Wade could not promise himself that it would not turn him on a little bit.

He sunk his fingers a little deeper into the back of Red’s collar, so that the festivities wouldn’t start too soon. Red’s neck was burning hot with his fury already.

“—don’t even know what it is that he sees in you two morons—”

Red pulled forward a bit, then twisted his head over his shoulder, practically begging Wade to let him loose.

“Are you two even listening?” Stark demanded. He was all tinseled out, as if that was supposed to intimidate or dazzle them lowly vigilantes into remorse or some shit. “This is child endangerment. You know this is child endangerment. At least, _you_ know, Wilson. Yeah, I heard about that whole stunt with the, what was it, mutant orphanage?”

“He ain’t smoking, man, chill,” Wade said coolly. Nice try, pal. He wasn’t going to rise to that bait, not when he had a Devil on a leash over here. “He just wants to play science. Ain’t hurting anyone—well. Me. But I ain’t anyone. L’il bit of extra cancer or whatever ain’t gonna make a hell of a lot of difference to me.”

“He’s got more than enough opportunities to play science in the labs,” Stark argued, “You know, where I can make sure he’s not—”

“What, doing coke?” Wade interrupted. He smirked when Stark’s chin went up just a fraction of an inch. “Yeah, that’s what I thought.” Red eased back a little in Wade’s grip to be smug with him.

“Why don’t we stop fooling ourselves, Stark,” Wade continued, letting his voice go lower. “We—me and Red here—we ain’t the number one danger to this kid, right now, and you know it. Us and a little fancy smoke? Nah, nothing. You, though? Now, that’s a whole other barrel of fish.”

Red rolled his shoulders slowly and stopped leaning forward. Wade released his grip on the back of the guy’s collar and threw his arm over Red’s shoulder instead. He allowed it for the aesthetic. Even leaned back into Wade a little bit so that Stark got the full impact of their conceit.

Stark cut his eyes at the two of them.

“You’re assassins,” he noted, “And you think you’ve got the moral high ground here?”

“Hey, now, Doc,” Wade goaded, “I’m the only assassin around here. Red’s just here to pretty the place up.”

Red gave Stark one of his brilliant smiles. Stark stared back with a careful neutral expression, as if Red wasn’t already reading his heart and his body heat and slowly ratcheting up the level of manic in his teeth to stoke the guy’s nerves.

“Anyways,” Wade pointed out, “We ain’t throwing the kid to the wind. Red’s even teaching him how to break a guy’s neck. That’s more than you’ve done, friend. So alright, whatever, be mad about a little bit of smoke if that makes you feel like you’re filling your moral obligation or whatever. Keep him away from us if you wanna try.”

Red laughed. Stark winced, then re-set his chin.

“Watch me,” he said.

 

 

“Wade, Mr. Stark’s being weird,” Spidey complained, perched on the edge of the dumpster Wade was digging around in. Red swore that that fucker had dropped the thumbdrive in this one. He swore it. Wade thought, not without affection, that maybe they needed to pour rubbing alcohol into Red’s ears or something to clear whatever shit was in there out.

“He said that you and Double D threatened him,” Peter noted, leaning over further into the dumpster. Wade would have snorted if he wasn’t trying not to breathe through his nose.

“We didn’t threaten him, did we Red?” he called over to the opposite side of the alley. A barked affirmative echoed out of the gray dumpster over there.

Oh. He’d migrated. Like a l’il skunk. Precious.

The kid looked Red’s way for a few seconds, weighing this information in his head.

“Why’s he so mad about the vaping, anyways? I didn’t even do anything,” he sulked.

 

 

The kid missed two very exciting, if Wade said so himself, team-ups over the next month. One fucking amazing car chase and another fantastic murder mystery involving two gangs each blaming the other for Red’s mark’s death. That one had turned into a real-life, high-stakes version of Clue. Ah, Spidey would have been so good at it.

Wade missed him a little bit, but he also got to run around with the Devil, who continued to be 20% more down to do some fucking damage than Red was around the kid.

Peter, Wade presumed from his torrent of text messages, was dying.

He was extremely displeased to be left out.

He had complained to his aunt.

He had complained to his friends.

He had gone out of his way to try to complain to Nelson and Page but had been intercepted by Stark suddenly redirecting his attention towards a new project which he _didn’t even want to do, god._

Wade asked Red what he thought about it, and Red simply shrugged and said, not our decision. Which was true. So Wade reapplied himself to trying to get Red to smoke with him in the meantime.

 

 

Spidey rejoined them in a completely different suit, one he’d made himself over the last couple months. The spider on the chest was larger with longer legs. He wore a huge jacket on top of it as he didn’t have access to the same kind of materials Stark did, and it was getting cold. He was unrepentant, however, and more than a little miffed.

He did not mention school or internship at all, to the extent where it was borderline vehement.

Wade didn’t ask. Red didn’t ask.

Especially not when they were trying to steal back a box of chemicals that Wade had rightfully stolen for his employer two years previous.

 

 

Stark gave in before the kid did because he had never personally experienced a teenager’s ire. He showed up like a dollar store at Christmas again on their meeting roof and, without taking off his helmet, said simply, “Alright, fine. You win.”

Which would have been fine, and even gratifying maybe, if Wade hadn’t been busy giving Red CPR.

It took Stark a few moments to realize why no one was acknowledging his entitled ass.

“Oh shit,” he breathed, “Do you need help?”

No, they were good. Red finally gasped and started coughing and Wade finally breathed out and sat back on his heels. He gave himself a second before reaching over to haul Red into his lap to elevate his lungs and let him breath for a few minutes.

Stark was not familiar with the ways of their people and reoffered help and transportation to a hospital.

“What the fuck happened to him?” he pressed, stepping closer so that he could kneel over Red and use his fancy computer to check his vitals. Wade didn’t really hear him because Red was coming back to himself and trying to sit up in his lap.

“Car?” Red rasped, as Wade knocked his elbows so that he crashed back down where he belonged.

“Yeah, buddy, car,” Wade confirmed.

“Damnit,” Red swore.

“I know.”

“Did you get ‘em?” he asked hopefully.

Wade smirked and fished a set of keys out of his suit. He shook them so Red could hear the jangle.

“Fucking _yes._ ” He threw out a hand, grabbing for them. Wade chuckled and dropped the keys into his palm. Red was tickled pink, practically giggling and cuddling the things.

“Worth it?”

“Totally worth it.”

Wade remembered Stark.

“Oh, hey. Sorry, did you need something?” he asked.

“Jesus fucking Christ,” Stark breathed.

 

 

Spidey celebrated his officially, though reluctantly, sanctioned return to the team by handing Wade the vape Wade hadn’t even realized the little shit had nicked off him.

“Try it,” the kid bubbled.

Wade was suspicious. Red was rapidly assuming the role of Wade’s shitty adopted little brother and Pete’s shitty big one and, upon learning that Wade despised Double Bubble gum, he had successfully recruited Peter to stuff that shit into all Wade’s fucking spice jars. All of them. Even the fucking bulk salt. The chances of Peter having replaced Wade’s perfectly good Butterbeer flavor with bubble gum was intolerably high.

“ _Wade_.”

“What did you do to it, tiny monster?”

“Made it cooler.”

“I see no hellos or kitties.”

“The _other_ kind of cooler,” Peter insisted.

Galaxies. He’d somehow managed to make the smoke purple _and_ glittery. Smelled weird, like toffee and vanilla.

Red sneezed and coughed.

Wade stared at the kid as the smoke blew away.

“It’s biodegradable glitter,” Spidey told him. “Really fine. Not a lot, you don’t want to inhale a bunch of it, but I figured you don’t care.”

Wade blew out another galaxy and watched Red suffer in its wake.

“Alright, you can stay,” he informed the kid.

 

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> pls don't try to vape food coloring or glitter y'all. do your homework before you try to get fancy. wade doesn't care if he dies, that's literally the only reason he's cool with it. 
> 
> alright, that's my last public safety announcement until someone pays me to do it


End file.
